Basics of
Server
A weekly Article from SWC - Engineering
INSIDE THIS ISSUE
1. The Difference between
PCs and Servers
2. Server Form Factor
3. Server Types
4. Server configuration
parameters
5. Few Terminologies
“Server is the heart of any
Smart City project
responsible for all the
processing of
applications/analytics.”
Sensitivity: L&T Construction Internal Use
Tech Innerve
30/5/2018
Volume 05
The Difference between PCs and
Servers
In many ways server hardware really isn’t all that different from
desktop PC hardware. Both use the same basic components such
as memory, CPUs, and power supplies. But the individual
components tend to be more advanced than the components
that are found in desktop computers. Servers may also make use
of redundant and / or hot swappable components. Occasionally
PCs might have redundant or even hot swappable components,
but such features are much more common on servers.
Server Form Factor
The term form factor describes the physical dimensions and
standards used by various system components and by the
computer as a whole. There are several different form factors
used for network servers, but the three most common form
factors are tower server\s, rack servers and blade servers.
Tower Servers
Tower servers look a lot like PCs. Each tower server is a
standalone machine that is built into an upright case. Tower
servers are used mostly in smaller datacenters. Larger
datacenters typically avoid the use of tower servers because of
the amount of physical space that they consume and because
they tend to be noisy. Another disadvantage to using tower
servers is that the cabling can get messy. Server racks and blade
server chassis usually have features that are designed to manage
cables, but tower servers have no such features.
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Rack Servers

As the name implies, rack servers are servers that are mounted within a
rack. The rack is of a uniform width and servers are mounted to the rack “Facebook massive arctic
using screws. Each rack can accommodate multiple servers and the servers server farm was built on
are typically stacked on top of each other. Because racks are designed to
the edge of the Arctic
accommodate standard sized components, many hardware vendors offer
rack mountable networking components other than servers. Rack mount Circle in Northern
components follow a form factor that is referred to as a rack unit. A Sweden. This server farm is
standard rack mount server is referred to as a 1U server meaning that it is able to let go of air
1 rack unit in size. A 2U server consumes two rack units of space within conditioning for cooling
the rack. Some vendors also offer 4U and ½U servers. The larger form and instead just use fresh
factors are usually used when the server needs to be able to accommodate Arctic air.”
a large amount of storage.

Blade Servers
Like rack servers, blade servers also adhere to a standard size and mount inside a special “rack”. In the case
of a blade server however, the rack is known as a chassis. Blade servers tend to be vendor proprietary. You
can’t for example insert a Dell blade server into an HP chassis. The reason why blade server design is proprietary
is because unlike a rack server, which is fully self-contained, blade servers lack some of the components that
they need to function. For example, blade servers do not have power supplies. The blade server chassis is
designed to accept various modular components, including the blade servers themselves. For example, a chassis
might contain a power supply unit, a cooling unit, and a blade server. The actual chassis design varies from
one vendor to the next, but most blade server chassis are designed to accommodate multiple power supplies,
multiple blade servers, and a variety of other components (such as network adapters, storage modules, and
cooling modules). With the exception of the cooling components, individual blade servers are mapped to the
individual modules or components.

Sensitivity: L&T Construction Internal Use

 Basics of Server
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“An important distinction

Server Hardware Configuration between memory and
 System Board storage is that the former
 Processor (Clock speed, Core Count, Cache size) clears when the computer is
 Memory turned off. On the other hand,
 Storage or hard drive system (internal Storage, RAID) storage remains intact no
 Network Controller
matter how many times you
 Power Supply
shut off your computer.”

Clock speed - This is how the processor operates, usually measured in GHz. Buying a high
frequency processor improves current system performance but also helps ensure server is able to
handle future demand.

Core Count - The number of physical processors within the processor itself. Multiple cores
enable better multitasking on servers that will run multiple applications. For example, virus scans
may run on one core while data backup is handled by another core.

Cache size - Each processor has built-in high speed memory located directly on and close to
the central processing unit (CPU). Larger cache size reduces the frequency that the CPU needs to
retrieve data from the system memory that sits outside of the CPU.

Memory- When you open a file or document, your server needs a place to temporarily keep
track of that file. It uses high-speed specialized chips called random-access-memory, or RAM. The
actual file is saved to your hard drive once you ‘save’ the file. RAM is designed for fast access and
quickly remembers where the file is stored in your permanent hard drive system.

Server Hardware Configuration

 System Board
 Processor (Clock speed, Core Count, Cache size)
 Memory
 Storage or hard drive system (internal Storage, RAID)
 Network Controller
 Power Supply

Sensitivity: L&T Construction Internal Use

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SWC Experience in Servers

Our project involves many applications to be exceuted in order to get the processed information. So wide
range of servers like rack, balde, tower servers are used. Video Management application, IoT applications,
EMS, NMS etc.. all requires compute devices to be used as a platform to do the analytics/compute. If a single
location/data center requires more applications to run then we go for balde server mounted in a chassis. If
only one or two applications then rack server is deployed at that location.

Nagpur Smart City Hyderabad City Surveillance

Sensitivity: L&T Construction Internal Use